Welcome back to the Rhythm of War reread! Today we launch into Part Five, and after all the avalanche rumblings the last few weeks, it feels a bit like we’re holding our breath. It’s actually a very quiet chapter, with Dalinar consciously leaving the Blackthorn behind to move more firmly into his Bondsmith role. Come on in and join the discussion!
Reminder: We’ll be discussing spoilers for the entirety of the series up until now. If you haven’t read ALL of the published entries of The Stormlight Archive (this includes Edgedancer and Dawnshard as well as the entirety of Rhythm of War), best to wait to join us until you’re done.
A: Before we launch into the chapter, we should talk about how we’re beginning Part Five, carrying the extravagant title “Knowing a Home of Songs, Called Our Burden.” Rather than evaluate the full ketek at this point, we’ll leave that until we get to the Epilogue, Endnote, and Ars Arcanum. Right now, I’d just like to point out that Urithiru is becoming, in a new way, a “home of songs,” with all the work Navani is doing. Not sure about the burden part, but I’ll leave that speculation for the Endnote. Also, the ketek was written by El, along with the epigraphs for Part Five, which seems like a good thing to watch.
Heralds: Shalash (Ash), Herald of Beauty. Lightweavers (Illumination, Transformation). Creative/Honest. Role: Artist.
Ishi (Ishar), Herald of Luck. Bondsmiths (Tension, Adhesion). Pious/Guiding. Role: Priest.
A: Shalash, I assume, is here for the interesting and important participation of the Lightweaver Stargyle. Ishar has two easy links: the view of him that Stargyle gives Dalinar, and of course Dalinar himself as the Bondsmith.
Icon: Kholin Glyphpair, for Dalinar’s POV.
Epigraph:
I look forward to ruling the humans.
—Musings of El, on the first of the Final Ten Days
A: On the first read, this was so devoid of context that it didn’t mean much. Who is El? Why is he going to rule the humans? What are the Final Ten Days? A bit later we’re going to see El himself, and oh yikes on bikes. He’s a Fused, and he’s scary even to other Fused. Also, he’s writing this on the last day of this book. He seems to be fascinated with humans, but at this point it’s hard to know whether that’s hopeful or terrifying. I lean toward “terrifying.”
P: Definitely terrifying.
Chapter Recap
WHO: Dalinar
WHEN: 1175.4.8.5—This would be nearly 2 weeks prior to the current Urithiru arcs, for what that’s worth. Due to the way Sanderson tries to structure his story-telling, he limits the number of major arcs in each Part, so we haven’t seen a Dalinar/Jasnah chapter since Part Three. Now we’re catching up.
WHERE: Emul, the final battlefield of the campaign
(Note: For the “when” notations, we are using this wonderful timeline provided by the folks at The 17th Shard.)
RECAP: Dalinar hikes across a battlefield, noting the way the battle played out. Though his people are celebrating the win, he finds himself revolted by all the killing. He carefully congratulates all the right people, but is greatly relieved to see his Windrunner scouting team. Stargyle, the Lightweaver who went with the team, shows him Ishar’s army encampment. The Illusion zooms in on Ishar, who sketches a glyph in frost that seems aimed at Dalinar; Szeth is appalled that the Herald appears to be Shin. Dalinar starts planning his trip.
Chapter Chat — Blackthorn vs. Bondsmith
To Dalinar, the scent of smoke was inexorably tied to that of blood. He would have trouble counting how many times he’d performed this same long hike across a fresh battlefield. It had become a habit to perform a kind of autopsy of the fighting as he surveyed its aftermath. One could read the movements of troops by the way the dead had fallen.
A: Setting the stage, here, another battle is fought and won. So here’s Dalinar, doing the thing he’s always done, but enjoying it far less than he used to. We’ve seen a lot of the contrast between the old Blackthorn and the Bondsmith versions of Dalinar, but Sanderson seems to be using this set-up chapter to highlight the differences. He starts out this scene with a fairly clinical evaluation of the battlefield: where one side or the other advanced, where they retreated, who was using what equipment, how the dead are treated. It’s… kind of brutal to read, actually.
Buy the Book
The Lost Metal
P: Absolutely brutal. The talk of human and singer blood mixing… what a powerful but awful visual.
Singer and human bodies smelled the same when they burned, a scent that would always bother him because of a specific battlefield. A specific city. A burned-out scar that was the mark of his greatest failure, and his greatest shame.
A: Anything I can think of to say about this feels trite. We all know: The Blackthorn, clinging to the influence of the Thrill, destroyed Rathalas in revenge for their ambush, and in so doing inadvertently killed his own wife. The Blackthorn did many reprehensible things—and some kinda heroic things—in the wars to create an Alethi kingdom under Gavilar, but Dalinar views that event as the single worst thing he ever did. (I don’t disagree.) I think at some level he thinks of that moment as the hallmark of the Blackthorn.
P: Which is accurate, I think. He was a ruthless killer and I feel that, as the man and Bondsmith he is now, he should look at that time of his life, particularly Rathalas, as a time to regret.
A: He certainly has much to regret, though during that phase of his life he also learned a ton about both tactics and strategy. I hope that his skill in those areas will help him with the upcoming contest of champions.
P: He needs every advantage he can get, so I hope you’re right!
There was a way to see the war ended. All Dalinar had to do was stop fighting. … Surrender was a valid tactic when your goal was the preservation of your people—at some point, continuing to fight worked contrary to that goal.
A: I have such mixed feelings about this… He’s basically thinking the same thing Lirin keeps saying: At some point it’s better to surrender than to keep fighting, if you want any of your people to survive. They draw the lines at different points, but it’s kind of inescapable. A general’s view and a surgeon’s view are necessarily different; the general has to think in much larger scale than the surgeon who is operating on one wounded soldier after another. Still, where is the line? When do you decide that more is too much?
P: Not being a general, I don’t know when it’s too much. But I know that the Fused, and especially Odium himself, need to be challenged. Their rule need not be accepted, no matter what.
He could trust that the Fused were not intent on extinction. Odium, however… he could not trust.
A: Yeah. It’s been fairly clear so far that, as long as you’re properly submissive, the Fused won’t destroy your home and family. Your livelihood might be another question, of course, but that seems to be up to the whim of the local Fused. Odium, though… from everything he’s seen so far, Dalinar has reason to believe that Odium wouldn’t mind killing all the humans. (As a side note, Taravangian seems to believe the same thing; for all he tells Dalinar to surrender, he sure worked hard to get Odium to agree not to destroy Kharbranth, and believes that he gave over the rest of humanity for that concession.) Even as Bondsmith, there’s a lot he doesn’t know about Odium, but he knows a lot more than he used to—and every bit of it worrisome.
P: Very worrisome. Even more so by the end of this book. Especially since Dalinar has no clue about what’s really happening with Odium.
A: Crikey. Does Taravangian know Dalinar, or secrets of the coalition, well enough to use anything against him? Or can we hope that he never understood Dalinar…?
But storms… ever since he’d conquered the Thrill and sent it to be sunk deep in the ocean, he’d found himself loathing these smells, these sights. That was becoming his deepest secret: the Blackthorn had finally become what men had been accusing him of for years. A soldier who had lost the will to kill.
A: Arguably, the day he trapped Nergaoul in that gemstone was the end of the Blackthorn. Dalinar still has all the knowledge and skills he gained during those years of increasing ability to kill efficiently, whether as soldier or general, but the addiction to the Thrill is gone. Killing for the sake of killing (much younger Blackthorn) or for the sake of winning a battle or a war… well, he’ll still direct the strategy, but there’s very little reward in “winning” per se. The competitiveness is gone; he just wants his people to live. It’s like… he’s left the Blackthorn behind, but he’s still struggling to become the Bondsmith Roshar needs.
P: And they do need him; sorely, I feel.
He congratulated them, acted like the figurehead he’d made of himself. Of all those he saw, only the Mink seemed to notice the truth. That there was a reason Dalinar had worked so hard to find his replacement.
A: Zing. I find this both melancholy and encouraging. While I certainly won’t say “anyone can lead the battles,” because clearly you need someone with a very deep understanding of strategy to be the high general, it’s high time that person is not Dalinar. As important as the role may be, Dalinar has a more important role to fulfill. It’s way beyond time for him to really pursue the Bondsmith role. I liked Dalinar as the grand strategist, but this isn’t really the end of that. The Mink will take over the coalition armes, but the Bondsmith needs to look at further-reaching strategies now.
P: I agree wholeheartedly. While I don’t know if Dalinar’s correct that Ishar is the key to learning more about his abilities, he does need to explore those abilities to see what he is capable of doing.
It’s like I’m drifting in the ocean, he thought. We won today, but Navani is still trapped. If he couldn’t retake Urithiru, everything collapsed. Losing it was a huge setback in his true goal: pushing Odium to be frightened enough to make a deal.
A: Yeah, that kind of further-reaching strategy. I’m amused by the thought that he isn’t going to retake Urithiru, though. That will be done by Navani herself, with help from Kaladin, Rlain, Teft, Leshwe, and Raboniel. Go figure. (Honestly, I choke up just thinking about how Raboniel delays Moash long enough for Navani to persuade the Sibling to bond. I don’t know if she realized that might happen, or even hoped for it, but at the end she was on Navani’s side, and for that I love her.)
P: That would have redeemed Raboniel in my eyes even if I hadn’t already liked her.
So he sprang to his feet with relief when Sigzil the Windrunner entered, along with two of his team and Stargyle the Lightweaver.
A: YAS. Let’s get on with the Bondsmith pursuit!
P: More skills, please!
The Lightweaving created a view from above, surveying a shoreline landscape. An army camped along the shore…
A: This would be Ishar’s camp, and over in Shadesmar, Lasting Integrity would be very close to it, where the water begins. Gulp. (I still can’t help thinking that something is going to come of that proximity besides groups like the Tukari that pursued Notum. Shallan and Adolin are right there, and that simply cannot be coincidence.)
P: I don’t believe in coincidences in Brandon’s books. Ishy’s troops are there for a reason, but I can’t figure how Adolin and Company will be brought over… unless Dalinar returns to that site and opens a perpendicularity.
[The moving illusion] depicted the entire camp of people, and most interestingly a large pavilion at the center. … A single person stood in front of the pavilion. He wasn’t wearing the same clothing as the soldiers, and wasn’t holding a weapon. … Didn’t seem Tukari, or Alethi. Yes … he was probably Shin, which was what Wit had said Ishar would appear to be.
A: Gulp. Most of the Heralds we’ve met so far have been sort of pathetic. Jezrien, Shalash, Kalak, Taln—those all have a range of capability, but they’re all mentally unstable and sad. Nalan is also mentally unstable, but at least he has a set of rules to constrain him to some extent. Ishar… mentally unstable for sure, but he seems to have developed a bad case of megalomania, (god-priest, anyone?) and with powers like his, that’s scary.
P: Terrifying. Especially once we meet him and get to see the crazy up close.
Ishar wore simple robes, deep blue. He spread his hands out to the sides, frost crystallizing on the stone around him, forming lines.
A glyph. The symbol for mystery, a question.
It seemed directed at Dalinar specifically.
A: I tell myself it’s just because he knows the Windrunners are most likely there just to report back to Dalinar, but it still feels… creepy.
P: Yes. Though he obviously knows who’s there and at whose behest, this is exceedingly creepy.
“I want to consult with Jasnah first—but we’re going to go meet that man, Radiant Sigzil, and find out what he knows.”
A: I’m glad he’s planning to consult with Jasnah, conveniently located nearby and one of the finest scholars on the planet. Presumably, this may also mean consulting with Wit, who actually knew Ishar at one time…
P: I doubt that Wit would advise Dalinar to seek out Ishar. Assuming all of the Heralds are crazy, there would be little reason for Wit to trust Ishar. Or even to trust that he’s not wildly dangerous.
History, Geography, and Cultures
On a battlefield this far afield, you burned the dead right here—sending only the officers home, already made into statues by the Soulcasters.
A: Oh, right, the Alethi tradition of Soulcasting the high-ranking people into stone. Makes me wonder… what kind of facility do they have out here to make the bodies look presentable before they’re Soulcast? (I assume they try to make them look nice, anyway.) Also, transporting a bunch of life-size stone statues back to their families (wherever they are) seems like a bit of an undertaking. (Sorry, bad pun.) So do other nations do this too? I don’t think they all have stone-Soulcaster fabrials, but maybe… Oh, never mind. Maybe it’s just the Alethi officers Dalinar is thinking of in the moment.
P: Yeah, despite the alliances in place, it’s highly likely that Dalinar’s only concerns (or maybe his initial thoughts) here are for the fallen Alethi officers.
Charnel groups moved through the dead today, solemnly cutting patches from uniforms, as each was supposed to have the man’s name inked on the back by the quartermaster scribe. Sometimes that didn’t happen. Or sometimes the writing was ruined in the fighting. Those families would go without closure for the rest of their lives. Knowing, but wondering anyway.
Hoping.
A: So is that a practice of all the nations/armies represented here? I suppose it makes sense: their version of dog tags. It’s good to see Dalinar considering the effect of this war on the families of the soldiers, in any case.
P: Exactly like dog tags! This practice was so familiar to me but I couldn’t place why. That’s exactly what it was, though… the similarity to dog tags.
Along with two Emuli leaders, who were archers. Remarkably, the highest calling among the Emuli army was seen as archery.
A: Hah. Yes, there are other cultures represented here… I always have to chuckle at Dalinar’s bemusement when another culture shows up with different values. Which still leaves the previous questions dangling. Were dead Emuli officers Soulcast to be returned to their homes? And did the common Emuli soldiers have their names inked on the back of their uniform patches?
P: You would think there’d be some way for them to identify their dead. Whether or not it’s the same method that the Alethi use is anyone’s guess. That would be a good question for Brandon.
“One of my…” Szeth stopped himself, likely remembering that he wore the image of an Alethi man. “Blood of my fathers,” he said instead, “that man is Shin?”
“Rather,” Dalinar said, “he is from the people who long ago settled Shinovar and became the Shin. The Heralds existed before our nationalities were formed.”
A: Poor Szeth. He spends most of his time conflicted about his people and his role in life anyway. Now to realize that the Heralds—with the various ways they have betrayed the people of Roshar—might actually look more like his people than any of the others, and this one in particular could be his grandfather or something… His poor mind is not going to take this well at all.
P: Right? Our little assassin isn’t the most stable of characters.
A: It does make me wonder how much the Heralds in general disguise their appearance. Ishar is the only one who has been noted to look Shin… but then we haven’t seen all the others yet, and presumably the humans on Ashyn had a variety of skin tones and hair colors. At least, Shalash, Taln, and Nalan are all described as having dark skin, and Kalak passes for Alethi pretty easily. Huh. I really want more information on the early days.
P: Don’t we all. Hopefully we’ll eventually get to RAFO some info of those days.
Oaths Spoken, Powers Awakened
Stargyle the Lightweaver—a handsome man with a soldier’s build and a ready smile. The name was a little much; Dalinar doubted he’d had that one since birth, but he had a reputation for friendliness, and the lighteyed women of the court certainly seemed to think highly of him.
A: Note one, this is a cameo for Steve Argyle, one of the artists who’s worked with Dragonsteel a lot—especially about the time this book was being written. Note two, I’m cracking up at “The name was a little much…” LOL. Yes, it is, but isn’t that typical of Lightweavers?
P: Lightweavers are definitely a bit over-the-top, from what we’ve seen. And yay for a Tuckerization!
He began to paint with his fingers in the air. Each of them did it differently—Shallan had explained that they each needed some kind of focus to make their Surgebinding work. Hers was drawings. Stargyle appeared to have a different method, something more akin to painting.
A: While this isn’t new information, it’s one of the little delights of the magic. While the abilities may be the same, or at least similar, the approach is unique to the person. He expands on this later by telling Dalinar that he was a pigmenter’s son, and he can keep the whole Illusion going—static or in motion—as long as he can focus on the colors.
P: I really like how Lightweavers each use their talents differently. Makes it super interesting.
Well, it wasn’t exactly an action-packed chapter, but there’s needful set-up: winding up the Emuli campaign, Dalinar’s trip to meet Ishar, the scary things they’ll find, and the mission to Shinovar in the next book. We’ll be leaving further speculation and discussion to you in the comments, and hope to join you there! Next week, we’ll be back with chapter 99, in which Jasnah is paranoid.
Alice is a former Sanderson beta reader who lives in the Pacific Northwest with her husband and two kids. The rains have come and the world is soggy.
Paige resides in New Mexico, of course. Though she’s currently rooting for Philadelphia in the World Series. Go, Phillies! Stomp Houston! Links to Paige’s other writing are available in her profile.
